5 everyday actions you can take to help the environment
Nandini Dhir shares the simple choices you can make to be more environmentally conscious.
Grocery shop with reusable bags, drive less, recycle paper, use a keep cup, shop second-hand: these are the go-to green actions we already do things we all already know. But we need to keep taking short showers, riding our bikes, and implementing environmentally-friendly changes because our laptop releases up to 90kg of carbon dioxide a year, and cows fart.
1. Marie Kondo your inbox
50% off Dominos $5 pizza, use code 50DOM until May 5th, 2011. Does it spark joy?
No, it’s expired, and it’s been adding to your carbon footprint for the past 10 years. Emails take up energy and therefore, create carbon dioxide. And whilst one email isn’t a big deal, 65 emails create the same amount of carbon waste as driving for a kilometre.
If you're someone with a red bubble on your mail app that reads over 100 notifications, take some time over the weekend to unsubscribe, block spam and delete emails. It’ll help the environment and also clean up your storage. Marie Kondo would be impressed.
2. Be patient with AusPost
When it’s your friend’s birthday tomorrow and you order the first thing you can find on Amazon with express shipping, you’re doing two things wrong. You’re not being a very good friend and you’re creating more emissions.
AusPost has a certain reputation that tests our patience. But ultimately, demanding fast delivery means more trucks and vans on the roads that aren’t at their full capacity because they need to meet express deadlines.
So get your friend’s gift a little earlier and be patient with shipping.
3. Free the tea!
Teabags are easy, you chuck some hot water on and you’re ready to go. However, they can be pretty harmful to the environment. They’re often not compostable and create a lot of packaging waste.
Opting for loose leaf tea and a simple tea strainer is a great, biodegradable, alternative. Loose leaf tea also consists of more natural products and can be a really good antioxidant!
4. Listen to music disconnected
Streaming has become the thing of our generation and we support the artists we love by listening online to increase their streams. Although we’ve been able to reduce our waste with the decrease in physical CDs, the more we stream, the more greenhouse gas emissions we create.
How do we get around this? Download your playlists and listen offline.
5. Freeze your peas
Most of us probably already buy frozen peas, but what about carrots, capsicums, broccoli and even fruits like bananas and strawberries. The majority of the fresh fruit and veggies we buy can last up to a year if frozen. So if you haven't been eating your fruit this week and it’s about to go off, don’t let it sit in the fridge until you need to throw it out. Freeze it!
If you’ve tried to grow a mango tree from its seed, or pick all the strawberry seeds off and harvest your own plant, you will know how difficult it is to produce fresh fruit and vegetables. So once your produce starts to ripen or reaches its peak, freeze it!